Translation of scientific, technical and technological in Vietnamese

 Most of specialized terms in Vietnam come from French, Chinese and English.

Because of the geological proximity, Vietnamese itself contain a lot of words originating from ancient Chinese. They are called Sino-Vietnamese.

In the early period of absorbing science and technology in Vietnam, when Vietnam was still a French colony in late 19th and early 20th century, the very first terms were introduced into Vietnamese from French.

Then after Vietnam gained the independence, from 1940s to late 20 centuries, a large number of student came to socialist countries especially Soviet Union and China to study. A large quantity of specialized terms were translated into Vietnamese using Sino-Vietnamese.

After the reformation, at the turn of 21th century, Vietnam exposed more to document and study in English, especially Vietnam are buying more and more technology from English-speaking countries and English has been a really lingual franca - a global language.

let's take a look at several example.

While technology of iron ore reduction of Blast furnace is quite familiar, Blast furnace is "Lò cao" in Vietnamese but somehow relates to "高炉" in Chinese. Basic oxygen furnace is "lò chuyển" in Vietnamese but somehow relates to "转炉" in Chinese, but people also call it "lò BOF". "segregation" is "thiên tích" in Vietnamese which is directly transformed from Chinese word "偏析" using Sino-Vietnamese.

The problem is sometimes there is a conflict in using and translating and understanding specialized terms. 

Some people consider languages as barriers but people also say that "speaking another language means having another more life". Learn knowledge in a different language is also a good way to change the point of view, the perspective of thought to approach new solution.

Quangngai, November, 24th, 2022